New Plans to Exploit the Power of the Sea

By Cynthia Taylor

The UK government is to announce plans for the founding of the marine hub for energy, this will be a first for the UK, and it is part of the government’s initiative to accelerate the progress in this sector.

This project in the South West called the South West Marine Energy Park and this will run beginning at Bristol and move up to Cornwall and then include the Isles of Scilly.

Greg Barker, Minister of Climate Change said to Sky News, that the potential for the UK’s marine energy is very large.

Mr. Barker continued that the government believes that there is approximately 27GW of electricity that can be harnessed, that would be the equivalent of 8 nuclear power stations, he felt it is a huge resource that was not being used effectively.

The definition of marine energy is the harnessing the power of the seas, this includes tidal currents and big waves; this will be used to generate electricity.

The Carbon Trust released an analysis last May which showed that the UK was capable of creating 68,000 jobs in this emergent sector.

Sky news had been given exclusive access to this new British wave power device; it is currently being developed off the coast near Dartmouth.

The prototype called SeaRaser was designed by a self-taught mechanical engineer, Alvin Smith. This British Investor learned everything he knows from fixing cars in his father’s garage.

This prototype device the SeaRaser, will be able to produce cheap electricity for the UK.

Mr Smith says that the device is capable of producing electricity cheaper than existing fossil fuels, he added that the secret to his invention was is simplicity.

He continued that it was basically a bicycle pump with a float on it, when he pump rises and falls it sucks the sea water into it and pumps the sea water out of it, this is done purely through the action of the waves in the sea.

What it amount to is that it is ‘hydropower’ without the dam. It uses the seas rise and fall on order to pump the water uphill, then it can be released which will drive the turbine thus, creating cheap and clean power.

Mr. Smith said that the device is inexpensive and create green energy cheaply, thus doing what no other type of renewable energy had been able to do before.

UK Renewable energy founder, Dale Vince of Ecotricity had teamed up with Mr. Smith so that they can develop the device and that their calculation have predicted that the device would produce the cheapest form of energy yet available.

The first SeaRaser commercial unit is expected to the completed within the next twelve month, the size if the unit will be about thirteen times larger than the prototype.

Mr. Smith envisages 200 devices scattered around the UK coast this will be enough electricity to power a city about the size of Liverpool by 5 years’ time.